A New Approach to Analysing and Visualizing the Management of Corporate Innovation Projects

Abstract

Innovating in a complex corporate context requires managing novelty, risk and uncertainty within an environment that strives for stability, efficiency and profitability on a daily basis. Resolving this conflict confront innovation project (IP) managers with extraordinary difficulties, which are normally addressed using classical project management methods and tools. This paper proposes an approach to analyze and capitalize the power of different project management methods within one IP in order to increase both the probability of success and speed to success. This is achieved based on the classification of project tasks and subtasks according to their uncertainty levels with respect to the design problem and the solution. The success of work packages is assessed against pre-defined output criteria. This methodological approach is complemented by the stakeholder dimension, which takes into consideration the involved stakeholders as well as their relationships and influences in the project. The analysis of an ongoing IP at a leading global industrial player in the life science industry serves as validation platform for the presented tool set.